A Lark Ascending

The concerts look great. Though I had to smile at 'US Tour'. Reminds me of US musicians who do a UK Tour - London.

I find it hard to give up a book once started - the trouble is that if I'm not enjoying it I find other things to do and end up reading nothing for a few weeks until I eventually face reality and start something new. Just started: Slowly working my way through this very long series of very long books. A marvellous series if you like police procedurals with no pretensions at being 'Literature' (with a capital L).

The Jeremy Steig is a beautiful record. Very glad to have it. Perked me ears up to Denny Zeitlin.

Wow! Read a lot of good things about this so tried it. Utterly compelling with lots of layers. Just watched episode 3. Utterly gripped.

You can't help but bump into Churchill in the UK but strangely I've never read a full bio. There are a fair few and they tend to be very long. This one is a comfortable 400 pages. The first 100 pages convince me I would not have got on with the bugger in his youth. Not that I'd have ever come close to the rarefied circles he floated in. Interesting, though. Easy reading.

Sax/bass/guitar. Beautiful record.

And several others.

Meet The Beatles! Japan Box (5CD Cardboard Sleeve (mini LP)Limited Release) Hoping we'll get the South Korean box soon.

"Mal Waldron - Moods" is tremendous. Not sure what format it will be in - it was originally a 2 LP; it re-emerged as a single disc with some tracks shifted onto another CD ('One-Upmanship). It has one of the most beautiful jazz covers I know:

Read this over the weekend. A relatively short, sociological study - a bit dry but nicely detached; occasionally drifts into academese but is generally easy to follow.

I can highly recommend the Quartet. Storming concert in Sheffield last October. Look forward to the Ogun. I've only just caught up with Louis' 'Bush Fire' from the olden days.

Have an eggsceptional holiday.

Not BBC 4 but as it is likely to only have any relevance for Brits I thought I'd put it here: In Pictures: 50 landmark BBC Two shows There a bit of jazz there!

Is Record Store Day In Crisis?

Interesting interview with Martin Davidson from last year here: http://subradar.no/article/martin-davidson I like his honesty about the way he came to be drawn to this type of music. No instant conversions but an admission that it often took a very long time to get a feel for the music. Apologies if this has been posted elsewhere. I don't recall it.

Being old-fashioned enough to still buy the Radio Times has its advantages!

And manufactured folk traditions. There's a marvellous book by Richard Lewis called 'The Magic Spring'. No folky, he set off on a year's tour of England to investigate folk culture - ends up being very affectionate but unearthing no end of spurious traditions. Quite a few concocted by local councils as a tourist draw like the Marsden Cuckoo Day Festival which started right at the end of the 20thC. I noticed the morris dancers on the trailer - a very easy target in the authenticity stakes.

Thought this might be of interest to some: Roscoe Mitchell, Fred Frith, George Lewis and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra 10.00 pm British time on BBC Radio 3 and on replayer for a week for those who can access it.

That was a very good programme ! Looking forward to Episode 2 tonight when he ponders the Victorian era. Watched that last night - very enjoyable. Though I'm not convinced that an obsession with re-imagining the past is a particularly English characteristic. He made the point about English law being based on precedent whilst elsewhere there is more of tendency to base it on reason (or what is considered to be reasonable at the time). I suspect it's more complicated than that. Next week looks good - the invention of the English countryside. Though you know in advance what he's going to say.

Oh, I'm not doubting that they were fun in their time. Or that reliving that fun can be fun itself. I'm just thinking of this as part of a general fogey-ishness that decries modern media on the grounds that it doesn't have the power/warmth/quality/whatever of vinyl/78s/cassettes/cylinder discs or whatever. Nothing wrong with nostalgia - I love a wallow in various mythical constructions of the past (some made by others, many self-assembled) - but it helps to recognise it as nostalgia rather than a reconnection with some lost truth (in this case the 'honest' C-90 over the 'crappy' mp3 [and other such formats]).

I much prefer the 'Smart Playlist' on an iTunes related product to the old C-90 cassette. Comes up different every time. The mix-tape thing was beautifully mocked in Nick Hornby's 'Hi-Fidelity'. How many of us tried to impose our vision of musical perfection on friends and acquaintances that way?And I wonder how many got listened to. The way the hero of the novel studiously tries to improve his girlfriend's 'taste' is both hilarious and a little uncomfortable! Like the cassette itself, the C-90 mix tape was a thing of its time and deserving of a bit of nostalgia. But I'd say it has been well superseded by what contemporary technology can do.

Quite:

As said on Goggle Box, I'm not smart enough for a smartphone. (or any kind of mobile phone). MG Oh, I have one and find it very useful. But I'm like the chap playing chopsticks where all the young people I know are like Alfred Brendel.

You are romanticising there. Collecting is often about acquiring things that are not easily available or in limited editions. Buying on a niche medium (in this case cassette) can be just as much about collecting outside the mainstream as buying a limited edition boxed set or a Japanese limited edition high spec CD. I imagine the motivations of those who exclusively or mainly d/l illegally are as varied as those who buy CDs, vinyl or legally download.

I tend to agree, except that I also identify with the popular music I was exposed to during my pre-teen years. So, I would probably say '56 to '76. For me, popular music began to sharply decline at the end of that 20-year period. Fortunately, that was just about that time that I got into blues, R&B, and jazz, which occupied me quite nicely as rock and pop were becoming less than appealing (to put it kindly). My teenage years didn't officially start until 1968 so I'm including a bit of pre-teen there. To be honest I remember little before the arrival of the Beatles (and then more as a phenomena than being actively interested in the music) apart from novelty songs like 'Itsy Bitsy...' and 'Sitting in the Back seat Kissing and a-Huggin' with Fred'. When I became aware of Rock n' Roll I just thought of it as old people's music (like jazz!).